Monday, May 12, 2008

Via the ASI blog review, there's a smackdown of a rather excited Gates of Vienna (no link, they are too unconcerned by Neo-Nazi alliances for my taste) post about the takeover of "Eurabia" by Moslem hordes. It's an echo of Mark Steyn's worries about European demographics. The smackdown links to another pinkosphere blog that first mentioned the ludicrous GofV post, and derides it as a right wing phenomenon. It ain't, and it ain't a new response to a combination of falling indigenous birth rates coupled with high immigration.

Going back 102 years (no link, my source is one of those papery, printed thingies and it's out of print):

The birth-rate had begun to fall in the eighteen seventies... Articles on the declining birth-rate in the Times of 1906 by Sidney Webb (1859-1947), the socialist planner and wire-puller, were widely noticed. A low-grade or foreign 25% of all parents, concluded Webb, was producing one half of the next generation. 'This can hardly result in anything but national deterioration; or, as an alternative, in this country gradually falling to the Irish and the Jews.' But even these prolific races were beginning to reproduce less quickly. 'The ultimate future of these islands may be to the Chinese!'

If you follow the first link, you'll notice that Muslim birth rates in Europe are also falling. It's odd how the most chauvinist defenders of Europe seem to have absolutely no confidence in the ability of European culture, specifically the greater empowerment of women compared to most others, to prevail in the longer run.

But Webb went on, and those who attribute everything good to socialist influence (such as, it has to be said, almost every socialist) should read on:

Webb hoped that this 'Yellow peril' (a persistent Edwardian bogey) would stimulate public opinion to support socialist welfare policies, especially in medical and educational provision. He believed that such policies would encourage the better-off and more intelligent who, because of their high economic and social aspirations, were now choosing to produce fewer children, to revert to having larger families.